1. I miss you
like I’ve never missed anything in my entire life
with impatience wrapped up in solemn contemplation
yearning for a taste
yet fearing the potential addiction
to the sight of you
the sound of your laughter
the peace held within your arms.

2. I have to grow up
and out of the idea of who I could have been
if I had taken your hand that day
like a child letting go of their imaginary best friend
I have to learn to let you go
even though I don’t want to
because you no longer exist in my reality

3. There is a puddle of tears
tasting of the tangy sweet love I felt for you
evaporating on the sidewalk
at the end of our childish dreams
and it fills up the air around me
so that I inhale your furtive glances
and late night whispered confessions

4. Songs that do not belong to my heart
steal all the words I wished to lay out in front of you
arrange them just so
just so that you don’t blame me for what I never said
but probably always felt

5. I hate you
in an impossible way
because there are still days
when I fear you are the one that got away

6. I love you
in an impossible way
because there are still days
when I believe that I’m not good enough
when all my flaws and intricate imperfections
cut at me from the inside
each slice reminding me the reasons why
I don’t deserve anyone,
let alone you.
Let alone me…
the foolish girl who tried to save herself
from her own misery

7. It all comes down to self-preservation
We are selfish beings
incapable of loving like we should
like we want to
like we promised each other we would

8. And I am out of promises
I’m out of guarantees
or anything involving a semblance of a plan.
I’d have nothing to offer you
except a chaotic heart
trying to heal from self-inflicted wounds

9. I still wonder if we’ll ever meet
and every feeling that trails along behind that thought
mocks me with the possibilities

10. It may take me till the count of ten
to remember why we are so tragically separate
but my thoughts always come back around
to reason and such simple logic
my heart however, needs some help.

Undress me from my sins
Slide them off my slim shoulders
And let them glide across each curve of my breast
Tenderly draw them down over my hips,
And unravel past my legs
To lie naked on the floor.

I will finally give myself to you.

Matches strike at the thought of your touch
Ignite the long forgotten pull
And light up the darkness where
Your kiss has been kept from me.

I will finally succumb to you.

I will spread myself thin across the surface of your thoughts
Rise up in the steam of your desire
And sigh into the mouth of your dreams.
Step into your waters,
Roughly still, trembling in each ripple
Like fire on my tender untouched skin
You burn.

And I will finally sink into you.

Each pore will soak you in,
Shiver as you move out

Put your hands on me,
Roam the shadows hidden in plain sight
Put your hands on me,
The ache will feel just right.
Put your ungodly hands on me
And let them profess all the things
You never tell me.

They will travel light,
Barely a reminder…
And then the pressure will grow firmer
Push against me.
Discover me
Tickle every nerve
Explore me

I am yours to know.

Take me
Taint me
Ravish me
Defile me

I have nothing left to lose.
Except to lose myself in you.

Press your fingers to my lips
Silence me in a whimper
And I will come.

I will come to you
With all my faults marking me
Claiming me as trouble
Writing me as weak and fragile

And I will finally wash you away.

Suds will remove the trails of your touch
Cleanse me of your sensual attack
Scrub me into something brand new

I will rise from the memory of you
Each moment dripping down my body
Some landing in the tub of our mistakes
To be forgiven.
Most kidnapped in the soft threads of a towel
To be dried or evaporated into thin air, to be forgotten

Clean and naked of your love
I will redress this body,
Extinguish the flames of now vacant desire

It spilled out of his lips
the words pouring out of his faucet mouth
and splashing onto the table,
droplets of hidden meaning rebounding to hit my bare skin
in the cool night air of mid September.

And part of me wonders why it has to go anywhere
why is not this moment good enough
for two hearts to be at ease with each other
in rediscovery?
Why can’t we just be here? In this moment?

Where is this going, he asks.

I’ll tell you where it’s going.

It’s going upstairs to my apartment.
It’s going down the street because I need a goddamn cigarette.
It’s going to the coffee shop on Tuesday morning in desperate need of caffeine because we were up all night talking.
It’s riding the light rail downtown to celebrate the joys of living
It’s going Christmas shopping a month into knowing each other and not having a clue what to buy.
It’s going skydiving because what the hell?
It’s staying in bed all day, not being sick.

It’s going to be drawn out for months
years even
if we do it right
and it will be beautiful
a masterpiece affair
that people will bid on at auction
at far too low a price
to earn the honor I had in loving him

It’s going to haunt my dreams
during my most sleepless nights
and plague the empty side of the bed
when he is gone.

It’s going over the hill of “just friends”
through the woods of heartache
that sing unrequitedly on the wind
past the town of regrets
where the motto states, “I wish I hadn’t said that”
and to a fork in the road.
Where one of us will have to make a decision.

It’s going into the deep caves of patience
so that we learn to let things go
instead of riling each other up for the sake of it
because we don’t know any better

It’s going to draw me in
and spin me around
the possibilities until I’m dizzy
and breathless wondering
how I got into this mess…again.

It’s going into the precious night
where we’ll make promises we cannot keep
and pretend that we never lose sleep
over each other.

It’s going to my bookshelf,
with all the stories that I’ll tell my children
so they understand that love is complicated and scary
and wonderful and difficult and completely nonsensical
So they know,
that when someone they might possibly love asks,
“Where is this going?”

Do you really want me to get published?
Do you realize what that would mean?

It means you’ll be officially immortalized.
You will never die.
You will be infused into pages upon pages
frozen by ink stains
pressed
pounded
punched
beaten to a bloody pulp
and your blood will clot in the form of words
that can never be taken back
that will never be apologized for
and they will be
bound between covers people might mistake you for.

You will be prosecuted and criticized
judged for your actions I keep trying to forgive you for.
You will be famous
recognized in public as the man I wrote about
and the whispers will follow you,
haunt you down the street.
The headlines will scream out your faults
the reviews will praise your determination
but ravage your selfishness

Do you want the world to know you?

Because I will tell them.

I will lay everything out on the table
auction off your love letters
and your hate filled emails
Confess to late night talk show hosts that every word is true
that I put too much trust in you

I will tell them of my secret longing for you
the autumn in which I fell for you
like leaves swaying to the ground,
realizing my mistake much too late.

the winter when I loved you
hopelessly waiting for sunlight
to break the dreary emptiness you’d left me with

the spring of my rebirth,
and no longer needing you,

to the hottest summer in hell
when everything I thought I knew fell
crumbling down around me
and every season after as I learned to rebuild.

I will tell them of your softness.
I will tell them of your stubbornness.
I will tell them that I loved you
and why I no longer do.

Do you really want the world to know you?

They will know you as I do,
harsh and insatiable
arrogant and irrational.
Impatience bordering desperation
and simply unforgiving.

You will be an ever-present symbol
of how painful and destructive love can be
locked within the weave of history
as the worst of anti-heroism.

I will publish what I like,
tell the world a story you may wish they never read
But I know now,
and have come to accept
you’ll never be capable of forgiving me.

It’s so strange
to think that you still exist
outside my memory
and that you breathe air
my skin will never touch.
Your lips form words
my ears will never hear.
There is a tapestry of moments
still being woven into your life
that we will never speak of,
even though, late at night,
I sometimes miss the sound of your voice.

I am on the edge of my own sanity—
still debating whether you were right.
Your words haunt me still.
And I am not fearless as I always wished to be.
I am terrified,
of all the things I could be.

So it’s strange to think that you still exist.
That you are still a reality—
and not a figment of my insecurities,
born to ruin me.

You walk on this earth,
smile and laugh,
maybe you cry—I don’t remember ever seeing you cry.
I thought I had shed all my tears for you.
But every so often my heart races,
my blood rushes,
my lungs sigh,
and a solitary tear wells up in my eye.

I still feel all the pieces that I was,
shattered on the floor,
when you finally broke me.

I’ve memorized the curves
of unseen scars
from all the battles that we fought.
They never open,
but those caverns still shake with your echoes
like a silent quake of regret
and I find myself resigned
to never forgetting what was lost.

It is so much safer
to keep you in my memories—
where no more damage can be done.
But to actualize you again,
to feel your presence,